"Further manipulation?" You mean like successfully implanting into the uterus, constructing a placenta, and evading the immune system of the host? If any of these processes is aided by other humans, have they then been "manipulated?" These glib platitudes just won't do.

As far as we know, every nucleus in the body does indeed have the potential to become a person. The distinction you're making (between improbable events that lead to a live birth and "manipulation" by other humans) is, in my view, nothing more than a preference for "natural" processes over "manipulated" (read: unnatural) processes. I am unimpressed by the efforts to translate such preferences into moral fortresses. And we haven't even addressed the failure of such distinctions when the process in question is a perfectly natural disease and healing comes as a "manipulation." By the time the "potentiality" argument is amended to patch its numerous holes, it looks so hopelessly ad hoc as to seem ridiculous.

The fact is that it will soon be easy enough to make a human "zygote" by returning a somatic nucleus (perhaps from a tissue stem cell with intact telomeres) to totipotency (or at least pluripotency). We'll need something a whole lot better than "manipulation" or its absence to figure out how to respect life. The potentiality argument will fail spectacularly. Ditch it now while there's still time. Or...transform it into one way of describing the wide boundary around which one might seek to build moral protections.

Steve Matheson

>>> David Opderbeck <dopderbeck@gmail.com> 03/10/09 8:47 PM >>>

No, Jim, every cell in our body does not have the potentiality to become a person until, as you note, an act of cloning is done. In contrast, a zygote (and even more so an embryo) has the potentiality to become a person without further manipulation.

David W. Opderbeck
Associate Professor of Law
Seton Hall University Law School
Gibbons Institute of Law, Science & Technology

On Tue, Mar 10, 2009 at 8:35 PM, Jim Armstrong
<jarmstro@qwest.net>

wrote:

I think the "potentiality" argument is particularly weak. In short (and admittedly oversimplified), every cell nucleus in our body has the "potentiality". Just transfer that nucleus into a suitable cellular context and it can (and does in cloning) become a living entity. But we slough millions of such cells every day, ...with their potentiality. But we don't even have to go there, because ova are likewise mostly sloughed by the body. Ah, but that leads us to the fertilized ovum.

The point of conception is latched onto by many at the initiation of a person. But that is simplistic and fuzzy too, IMHO. An unfertilized ovum can be teased into beginning mitosis without any fertilization. Quite a few creatures in fact do that spontaneously (chickens, sharks, etc.). So it seems to me that might cast a bit of a shadow over the adequacy of the conception definition of personhood .

But there is also the matter of a high degree of natural attrition of such zygotes, as well as after the cellular cleavages (mitosis) begin. [As I understand it, it is after some 2 weeks of these cellular multiplications that one might refer to the organism as an embryo]. So this at least might ask for some thought as to the "value" of any given zygote or even embryo, since many (most?) embryos do not successfully mature to a born baby. Is any given one of them then effectively of some fractional value from a pragmatist view? Does this significant natural attrition of potential humans nuance the argument at all in the tradeoff of potential life vs potential benefit to current and future generations?

So, as you say, David, the analysis is truly "not by any means obvious", but these considerations (among others) cause me to lean in the direction voiced by Burgy.

This embryonic stem cell controversy may be a transient issue at the end of the day, because so much research is also being done with non-embryonic cells, and many researchers are not insensitive to the ethical concerns. Dr. William Hurlbut's ANT (altered nuclear transfer) work, for example, was inspired by human cellular structures that develop naturally (teratomas), but have developed in a flawed way such that they cannot develop into a viable baby. He is a practicing and articulate Christian. [ANT summary here ( http://www.alterednucleartransfer.com/?page=4a&view=1 ).]

JimA [Friend of ASA]

David Opderbeck wrote:

I don't think the ethical issue is quite so simple, Burgy. For example, if one is agnostic on the personhood of a human embryo, as you and probably most other people are, or if even those who say "no" here have to admit some uncertainty, then the precautionary principle comes into play. Curiously, the same people who strongly assert the precautionary principle as a backstop for global warming mitigation often completely blow it off when it comes to embryonic stem cell research (and vice versa!).

Also, the options aren't just the polar "person vs. non-person." Many opponents of human embryonic stem cell research argue from "potentiality." If embryos are not "persons" in a full sense -- e.g., if personhood relates to existing cognitive functions -- they are at least "potential persons." In such a case, one mode of ethical analysis might be to weigh the potentiality of an embryo's personhood against the potentiality of the research program. The result of such an analysis is not by any means obvious.

Finally, all of the above assumes that a consequentialist ethic is necessarily the right and only appropriate kind of ethical analysis to employ in this case. Why? Many ethicists would argue that consequentialism ends up being incoherent, and therefore favor deontological and/or virtue perspectives -- a position with which I'm quite sympathetic.

David W. Opderbeck
Associate Professor of Law
Seton Hall University Law School
Director, Gibbons Institute of Law, Science & Technology

Doug posted, in part: "public policy should be based on scientific
facts not ideology.
I think this is an awful statement. It's a false dichotomy.

Scientific "facts" don't make public policy; they form a necessary
informational base, but every action based on that knowledge also
requires a moral/ethical/ideological decision."

I don't see it as "awful," but a simple factual statement. If one
takes it to mean "based ONLY on scientific facts," then, of course,
I'd agree that it is "awful." I'd probably use a stronger term.But it
does not say that.

Relative to the stem cell issue, it really boils down to the question
"does a frozen embryo have personhood -- a soul?" For those asserting
"yes," the issue is clear; stem cell research is immoral. For those
who assert otherwise, stem cell research in morally OK.

Having read a lot on this, I tend toward the latter position, but I do
NOT claim certainty. I don't know that any of us can claim certainty
on the issue.

It is a classic case that whichever side of the issue you choose, you
run the risk of doing harm (or not avoiding harm).

jb

On 3/10/09, David Campbell <pleuronaia@gmail.com> wrote:
> Yes, in the case of embryonic stem cells there is little disagreement
> about the science, and the self-identified "scientific" policy is
> merely one ideology among many.
>
> In other cases, such as environmental or evolution, there is denial of
> the science that could be described as disagreement about the science.
> Nevertheless, even in such cases, science is still descriptive.
> Science cannot be morally prescriptive, as that is outside its scope.
>
>
> --
> Dr. David Campbell
> 425 Scientific Collections
> University of Alabama
> "I think of my happy condition, surrounded by acres of clams"
>
> To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@calvin.edu with
> "unsubscribe asa" (no quotes) as the body of the message.
>

--
Burgy
www.burgy.50megs.com ( http://www.burgy.50megs.com/ )
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